Being Bliss

All too often we get caught up in being human thinkings or human doings instead of being human beings. I didn't realize until recently that being is a unique state into itself. Being is being present in the moment. Being is enjoying the company your with instead of thinking about what you're going to do next week, what you're going wear to work tomorrow, where you're going to go on vacation, or even what you're going to write about in your blog.

Being seems to come upon us when we least expect it, when we're so solidly in the moment that our bodies seem at one with the world around us. Thought seems suspended as we are uniquely one with our bodies. Since I've been practicing bliss, those moments of being have come to me a lot more frequently or maybe it's just that I've been more aware of them.

John and I spent Friday night in a hotel and before he arrived, I drew him a bath and lit a beautifully scented candle so that he could wash away the cares of the work day and slip into weekend mode. The very act of lighting a candle and preparing for bliss, helped me slip into a state of being rather than doing and instead of going back to a mental tally of everything I had planned for the evening, I was able to go with the flow and just enjoy life as it unfolded.

We enjoyed a relaxing dinner at Carson's Ribs and then headed out to the Blue Frog, a funky little bar and grill in Chicago's River North neighborhood to sing Karoke and enjoy a few drinks. The Blue Frog is what could nicely be classed a dive bar, but the people were nice and not scary and the decor was interesting. I decided to take the plunge and actually sing Karaoke for the very first time. I picked Gretchen Wilson's Redneck Woman and I had hopes of belting it out famously and getting those wonderful "Hell Yea's" from all the redneck girls in the place, but sadly that was not to be as the Karoke machine messed up and I ended up off key and out of sync, but no one seemed to care and they cheered for me nonetheless.

After Karaoke, we headed back to our hotel to warm up and decide whether or not we wanted to head back out. We decided we did so we dumped the bags, I grabbed my jacket and we headed downstairs. John need a cigarette, so we chilled under the portico entrance to our hotel and danced the the jazz playing. As we talked, we realized that other people might be driving by and "looking at the crazy fools dancing under the portico." We decided we'd reached a point in our lives where we didn't care if people thought we were weird. Their opinions just didn't matter anymore and that in itself was a pretty blissful feeling.

Saturday morning, we spent a lazy morning in bed watching TV and cuddling before it was time to head off to meet the kids for a lunch at the Rosebud and a trip to the planetarium. I enjoyed the spaghetti and meatball (yes, it really is just one meatball) and then we grabbed a cab to the planetarium. It was a spectacular spring day in Chicago with just a touch of warmth in the air. We'd signed up for membership in the Adler so we got to enjoy all the shows and the exhibits. Sinking into the comfortable chairs in the auditorium, I felt all my bliss melt away as the room was the perfect temperature and their was soft music playing. Once the show started, I was nearly a goner as I felt my bones melt away as I slipped into a perfect state of being. I felt as if I was one with the universe.

The awesome state of being lasted all the way back home and one of my challenges will be to figure out how to maintain that state of being in the ordinary world.

City of Bliss

Growing up I used to think that Chicago was just a city of big blocked buildings with no artistry whatsoever. Maturity and more time spent downtown has taught me that beauty and bliss exist throughout the city, if we only take the time to look.

I've made several sojourns downtown recently and it seems as everyplace I look there is amazing art and artistry in the most unexpected places. We've made several trips to Rosehill Cemetery over the last year or so to look at the amazing funerary art and wonder at the stained glass windows in the mausoleum. Once you get past the creepy and oppressive feeling of being surrounded by tons of granite and monuments to the dead, the mausoleum is an amazing place that is full of beauty. The lower level has individual rooms that each have a beautiful and personalized stained glass window. When you walk through in the afternoon when the sunlight is streaming through the windows, the corridor is full of rainbow light that brings peace and happiness to your soul. The John G. Shedd (yes the aquarium guy) has a chapel on the first floor with blue lights that when the sun is shining just right transform the chapel into the color of the Caribbean.

Downtown Chicago, artisans have turned even the ordinary into the artistic. One of the bridges over the Chicago River has amazing bronze medallions along the steel railing. Although at first glance, they look like five pointed stars, in reality they are flowers. At the entrance to the bridge, there is another medallion of a six leaved clover. Even the rusted steel itself provides beauty to those who look closely enough and see beautiful play of light and patterns on the structure.

Chicago is also a city full of art both big and small. Our most famous sculptures are the Picasso that stands guard over Daley plaza and the giant silver bean downtown, but other sculptures can be found throughout the city. I was walking back from Ogilive station to our hotel tonight and I detoured so that I could walk by the Brittanica building and I found an amazing sculpture that looks like a boy walking along the top of an inverted V.

Chicago also hosted the "American Gothic" sculpture downtown and it was viewed by millions in its spot by the Chicago Tribune building. Although the original is housed in the Art Institute just downtown, more people visited the statue in the 18 months it was in residence than have ever gone to see the original.

That's the amazing bliss of street art, it brings unexpected beauty, humor, and bliss to our everyday lives. The art of the everyday isn't something you have to make a special excursion (and pay an entrance fee) to see, all you have to do is pay attention to the wonderfully blissful world around you.

Melting Bliss

Spring comes to Chicago in puddles of slush, dirty white snow, and that indescribable scent in the air that signals that Springtime is coming. Looking out my front window I can see that most of the snow has melted, there are just a few patches where the sun doesn't shine full force during the day. The ground, where the grass will be a brilliant green in a month or so, is now a muddy dark pit of mud that clings to your shoes and the dog's paws.

Downtown, the warmth and wind have melted most of the snow into puddles, but a few patches cling tenaciously to life along the shadows of the skyscrapers and buildings. The brilliant white of the winter's snow has been turned a dirty gray with black flecks by the passing trucks and the footsteps of the thousands who trod the city's streets.

The city's hundreds of benches of stone, brick, and metal sit unused as pedestrians hurry past too chilly to stop and soak up the beauty of the city. While during the warmth of the summer, sitting on the benches allows tourists and residents alike to soak up the warmth of the sun, today they'd be soaking up the cold from the concrete.

Despite the still chilly winds blowing off Lake Michigan, more and more brave folks are walking along the lake and taking in the beautiful panorama that is the city of Chicago. The city feels vibrant as if it is shaking off the cold mantle of winter and preparing to embrace the beauty and softness that is spring in Chicago. The wind holds that indescribable promise of the warmth to come, but for now there is bliss in anticipating the warm weather to come.

Bars of Bliss

Going to Hooters never appealed to me until I watched Undercover Boss and realized that maybe I'd been judging it unfairly for all these years. Like a lot of women, I based my sanctimonious attitude about Hooters on what I thought I knew about the place versus my actual experiences.

I thought Hooters would be a dark, dirty, and tawdry little place full of older men ogling young women dressed in skimpy little outfits. However, watching Coby Brooks' go undercover to see what was really going on in his business, I realized a couple of things: Hooters is more like a little beach bar than anything else and it's not only dirty old men that go to Hooters. Along with some sanctimonious and uptight broads who judged Hooters the same way that I had, the video showed families and couples heading out to Hooters to enjoy wings and burgers.




John and I were downtown the other night and after dinner we were looking for a place to watch the Blackhawks game. There was a Hooters just up the street so we decided to head in and check it out. The first thing I noticed at Hooters wasn't the girls in skimpy tank tops, but the wood paneling on all the walls and the Christmas lights strung up along the walls and the bar. There was a slight wait, so the hostess (how was wearing a polo shirt and loose shorts) said we could sit at the bar since we were only getting drinks. A cute young African American girl named Andrea served us our drinks and then we settled in so John could watch the game and I could observe the joint.

On the stainless steel above the grill, there was a wall of bumper stickers full of slogans. Some of our favorites were, "I wish I was Barbie because that B*** has everything" and the Blackhawks bumper stickers. We also noted bumper stickers for a host of cities and countries including Vancouver.


There were a couple of parties of young college guys, but overall the patrons were a mix of young and old, men and women. Some of the Hooters girls were drop dead model gorgeous wearing extremely tight shirts that showed off their assets to a considerable advantage, but others were ordinary clean cut girls wearing polos and shorts. There were all wearing sneakers that I could tell got considerable use as they never got a chance to take a break. Observing them, I realized that these young ladies had to be strong (those plates of food aren't light), hard working, and tactful. Although the patrons in there when we were there were fairly well behaved, I'm sure there are times when the clients aren't so well behaved and the girls have to politely tell them they're not interested without loosing a customer.

And unfortunately, in today's world, girls who work at Hooters aren't the only ones that have to be able to deal with drunk customers. My daughter Cat works in a bakery and every so often on Saturday and Sunday morning she gets drunks in from the bar next door that she has to politely fend off.

Expanding my mind and being willing to give Hooters a chance got me outside of my shell and helped me realize that there is life outside my sheltered little world and that is an eye openingly blissful realization.

PS: The only reason there aren't pictures of Hooters girls in this entry are that the ones I took turned out pretty bad.